Freshfields and Slaughters give way on pay gap

The gender pay gap across the entire workforce at magic circle firms Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Slaughter and May has been revealed after demands from a committee of MPs.

Freshfields reported a mean pay gap of 60.4% when partners are included; at Slaughter and May it was 61.8%.

Both firms declined to include partners when reporting their pay gap data under the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations earlier this year on the grounds that the legislation requires only employees’ pay to be compared. With partners not included the pay gap at Freshfields was 13.9% while at Slaughters it was 14.3%.

The revision of the figures follows a request from the House of Commons’ Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Committee for each of the five magic circle firms to incorporate partners into their data. At an evidence session last month, Slaughter and May’s head of HR, Louise Meikle, was critcised by the committee for the omission of partners.

Linklaters and Clifford Chance had already included partners in their gender pay gap reports. Allen & Overy, which comes in for particular criticism from the committee, was alone in not reporting its data. The firm previously told the Gazette it will report this information in September.

The debate over whether partners should be included was sparked by the ‘big four’ professional services firms, KPMG, EY, PwC and Deloitte, who all revised data following comments by Lloyd’s of London chief executive Inga Beale and Law Society vice president Christina Blacklaws.

Rachel Reeves, chair of the BEIS Committee, said today: ‘It will surprise no-one that including partners in reporting reveals a wider gender pay gap. The picture wasn’t a pretty one but the big four firms at least acknowledged the problem by including partner data, a social duty which somehow escaped, with some exceptions, the major law firms.’

She added: 'A&O can’t even come clean on its partner data now. It’s easy to talk the talk on diversity and inclusion but if a business is dragging its feet on providing even basic information about its gender pay gap then it begs the question of how seriously it takes its responsibilities to valuing all its staff and how dedicated it is to committing to promote female associates to partner level.’

In its letter A&O said it was committed to supporting women at work and ensuring they progress their career at the firm.

The published letters also include details on the proportion of female associates and female partners at the firms. Clifford Chance revealed that since 2010 promotions to partners were 33% female and 66.7% male. Freshfields said that since 2015, 42% of partner promotions have gone to women.

Beware of statistics. Imagine a firm consisting of male sole practitioner with profits of £80,000 and one female secretary earning £20,000. Gender pay gap: 300%! I would hope that the reason for the gender pay gap in these big firms is not that males are paid more than females for the same job but that there are more male than female partners (ie. high earners) in those firms. The point is that you can't include all partners and employees in the same averaging exercise because the average is slewed by the very large amounts partners earn compared to employees. If, say, 65% of the partners are male that will give rise to a meaningless average pay gap across the firm. Of course, it begs the question of whether these firms should have more female partners but a meaningless average has no bearing on that question.

I would not have turned down a Slaughters partnership (am female and always worked full time and worked there although I didn't particularly see sexism there - they just didn't appreciate my true brilliance; their loss)

Yes, the thing is that the figures don't and can't show whether the genders are being "treated equally" because these figures don't show what each person is doing to earn his or her money. Inequality of outcome may be caused by inequality of treatment but on the other hand it might be caused by inequality of input on the part of the employees or partners concerned. The data on gender pay (or profit share) gives no way of distinguishing between the two possible causes.

You might as well say that the fact that more women than men are now qualifying as solicitors (and being taken on as trainees) proves that men are being discriminated against when applying for trainee-ships, but of course it shows no such thing, because we don't know whether men are applying for trainee-ships in equal numbers to women, or whether those applying are of the same quality. If we knew that men and women applied for trainee-ships in equal numbers and that the applicants were of equal quality across the genders, then the fact that more women than men are being taken on as trainee solicitors WOULD show that men were being discriminated against.

Yes it is, 8.53. The whole point is that there are concerns about a lack of parity between the sexes in terms of opportunity AFTER having joined the profession. Merely being here doesn't demonstrate that sexism does not exist.

This is all stuff and nonsense. A previous article on here has already shown there are more females than males being entered onto the roll, show because of that the figures will slowly change of their own accord as the Solicitors progress in their careers. Is all this reporting therefore really that necessary?

The "gender pay gap" is a negative as many industries are showing. The reason for disclosure was to ensure that all industries / economic activities treat gender equally. Law should be no different and the vast majority complied. Why these didn't I don't know and if there is no issue then the figures will say that and we move on and focus where there is an issue. However openness and clarity if needed. I am amazed in the 21st century that some think equal pay for equal work seems to be such a sore point.

This article is predicated on the assumption that the "gender pay gap" is something negative. Presumably its authors believe that most employers are rampant sexists and will pay a male lawyer more than a female lawyer for doing exactly the same thing, because they hate women. It takes no account of different working practices, or the fact that women tend to have a pretty significant life event called "having a child" which necessarily means you have less time for work (especially partnership).

What's the ultimate goal of such articles and drives? To have equality of outcome? To ensure every employee is paid exactly the same? If so, why stop at sex? Why not ensure every ethnicity is paid the same? Every sexuality? Every sexual proclivity? Will we hear about the foot fetishist's pay gap soon? If not, why not?

Equality of outcome is communism by another name, and whilst our government is filled with ex-Marxists (on both sides), I would have hoped we lawyers would have been smarter. In any small organisation, women will be appreciated for what they can bring to the firm. In any large organisation, even if the former doesn't apply, there'll be sufficient personnel procedures to ensure any individual incidents of sexism would be dealt with. And if they're not, pick another firm; there are plenty out there who will appreciate you.

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